The second sentence feels grammatically incorrect; how can I revise this to be less awkward-sounding yet still punchy? (The thought continues in the rest of the paragraph, explaining his feelings in more depth; this is the end of one paragraph and the beginning of another.)

Edit: I came back to the paragraph to give context, decided I didn't like the way it flowed into the next sentence, and ended up changing it entirely: "Or perhaps not despite; that would imply I saw it as a flaw." C'est la first editing pass.

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As a writer of fiction, you have enormous license to arrange words in the ways that you hope will affect the reader. I see nothing wrong with your first two sentences: it's the way people speak, after all.
–
Pete WilsonJan 29 '12 at 18:43

4 Answers
4

The second sentence feels grammatically incorrect because it's not a sentence; it's two fragments joined by a semicolon. That doesn't make it wrong, but that's probably why you're reacting that way.

If you want to keep the fragment style, I would tweak it thus:

Or perhaps not despite -- perhaps because of.

I made two changes there. First, I emphasized "because of", since that's the key insight that (I assume) you'll build out in the sentences to follow. The other is that I replaced the semicolon with a dash; a semicolon puts up more of a "barrier" between the clauses (like that one I just used), while a dash is more flexible. In this case the dash suggests a thought sequence, which seems to fit with what you're trying to do. (If you want to suggest a more gradual, contemplative process, instead of a dash you could use an ellipsis -- the first thought "trails off" to be replaced by the second.)

This may be a bit too terse for your character, but it adds impact by being more direct. Without the direct reference to the sentence above, it becomes like an idea that occurs/emerges from the first one.